Hamilton drone pilot under investigation

A Hamilton marketing business is under investigation after police received two complaints about a video it posted online shot over Hamilton with a flying camera.

Adam Crouchley, of Dori Media, is under Civil Aviation Authority investigation after Hamilton police received complaints that his 3 minutes and 20 seconds video on YouTube broke the law.

Crouchley posted a link to the video to his Facebook page on Saturday morning after police called at his Hamilton East home at 7.45am asking him to remove the video because someone had complained to CAA.

It had been on YouTube since Thursday.

The police gave him a warning because the video showed night footage, and video had been shot close to buildings.

"They said there was a complaint to the Civil Aviation Authority and told me I was was not allowed to fly at night, in the city within 150 metres of buildings," Crouchley said.

"They said to me: 'I see you were flying in Victoria St, which is close to the police station. You are not allowed to fly close to the police station'."

Crouchley said police had said the Phantom 2 drone was dangerous because its compass interfered with its GPS.

"I corrected him and he said, 'you can be smug all you like but you have broken the law', and I said, 'sure, I broke the rules, but I did not know there were rules'.